those landlords who pique themselves on Courtesy: and the gentleman tourist, with Submission be it said, is not one of those tourists who travel with four horses,-or. even by the stage-coach: and foot-travelers in England, especially in the winterSeason, do not meet with high consideration. Which premises weighed, if you were to ask for a night's lodging at your first entrance, I bet ten to one that you will get none; no, not though the house were as empty as it is probably full by the infernal din. But do what I tell you: Call for ale, porter, or wine, the moment you enter. As fast as your reckoning mounts, so fast will the frost thaw about the landlord's heart. Go to work in any other way, and I'll not answer for it but you'll have to lie in the street."

With full determination to pay attention to his advice, Bertram again laid his hand upon the latch; opened the door; and made his appearance for the first time in his life upon that famous stage in the records of

novelists-a British inn.

In the bar of the Walladmor Arms are assembled a mixed party, of whom the most interesting person to the novel is Mr. Dulberry, a decayed tradesman and " alderman" of Manchester, and a radical reformer. He is also somewhat of a relation to Dogberry for he tells Bertram that it never has gone well with old England since Brevia Parliamentaria, or "Short Parliaments" as he translates it, went out of fashion; and is much surprised to hear that his substantive in the above piece of erudition was suspected to be an adjective, and his adjective a substantive: however the main interest of his part is derived from the unseasonable parade of his constitutional principles: Runnymead, the Bill of Rights, Act of Settlement, "Castlereagh's hussars," "hoofs of dragoons," and "Manchester massacres," are the notes upon which he rings his changes: he is a purist and a rigorist: treading on his toes he views from the high station of Magna Charta: as much as possible he evades all taxes; indirect taxes even he evades by drinking only smuggled brandies and with all this he combines a ludicrous ostentation of committing suicide as befitting a patriot, though uniformly taking his measures so as to provide himself with some excellent interruption or apology for delay. This gentleman calls the attention of the company upon himself

by setting the "Courier" on fire, which he does under horror at a paragraph stating that an Englishman had been arrested in the Isle of Wight for political offences by the emissaries of Government. "What the French Government?"No: the Government, the company exclaim," English Government." And he proposes that all present should unite in some strong remonstrance to Government on the case. But, as it soon turns out that the prisoner was charged with having taken part in the Cato-street conspiracy, the whole room decline any interference on his behalf. This brings up the subject of the prisoner, who is called Nichols or Nicholas in the newspaper-and turns out to be a person well known in that neighbourhood for his daring character, great powers of mind, and romantic exploits, both as a commander of Rotterdam smugglers and as a pirate. Several striking anecdotes are told of his hair-breadth escapes, and the singular address and presence of mind which he had displayed in that very bar in baffling his pursuers: and the whole picture is finished by a suggestion that his brain had latterly been crazed by his. passion for a young lady of that. neighbourhood (the niece of Sir Morgan Walladmor): the notion of Nichols in love is treated with ridicule by the coarser part of the company : though it is urged in proof, that the sanity of his actions had latterly been so much affected by his attachment to Miss Walladmor, that the Rotterdam merchants had refused any longer to confide their interests to his management, and had displaced him for Captain le Harnois. All present, strangers or not, are now anxious to know more of the newspaper paragraph: this had been reduced to ashes: but, on Dulberry's report, the "Courier" had gone on to state that Nichols had been shipped in the Halcyon for the coast of Wales, where he was to take his trial for some rencontres with the revenue officers, on which a verdict of guilty was more certainly anticipated than on his transactions in Cato-street. This naturally brings up Bertram, who informs the company of the fate of the Halcyon-and transfers upon himself a good deal of the interest which had before settled upon Nichols.

The next day but one is St. David's day every man appears with a leek in his hat: and an annual procession to the church, which passes the inn with much antique pomp and ceremony, serves to introduce Sir Morgan Walladmor, of Walladmor Castle, who presides as the great territorial proprietor of the neighbourhood, MP., and so forth. Sir Morgan Walladmor rides in the procession along with his beautiful niece: and both are described as exhibiting the traces of deep mental suffering in their countenances. Sir Morgan is elaborately costumed; and, but for a double cloud of grief which sate upon his mind, appears to be constitutionally a very jovial person; a great whig; a violent persecutor of radicals and smugglers; and, as we hinted once before, of the reader: but otherwise as worthy a man as one could wish. By the way, on the subject of Bore, that weighty office (so necessary in every well-regulated novel as a constitutional check upon the levity of the other characters) is usually lodged in one sole autocrat or despot: but in Walladmor the author has thought fit, upon considerations of human mortality, to vest it in two personsa sort of Roman consulship: and the reader may take our word for it that it is no consulship of Cæsar and Bibulus: : no sinecures are allowed here. These worthy Duumviri are Dulberry and Sir Morgan: both in fact are mad: Dulberry from commercial losses and politics; Sir Morgan upon the topics of astrology and genealogy. This madness of the baronet's, the reader sees, is Janus-faced, looking forwards and backwards. Welsh genealogy however is the great fundus (as the critics express it) from which Sir Morgan draws. He descends in quest of his game as low as one Rhees-ap-Meredith, who lived it seems 1824 years before Ann. Domini 1. It is a fact: 1824 years below the Christian æra does this worthy magistrate send down his bucket for pure extract of bore: and as we happen to be in the corresponding year above that æra, we may say of

Sir Morgan, considered in his functions of bore, that he is like Virgil's oak:

Quantum vertice ad auras,

We forget the exact words, but the dródoog is-tantum radice ad Tartara* tendit.

But we must check our wit, and proceed:-Agreeably to ancient custom, Sir Morgan on returning from church holds a court for redress of grievances, petitions, &c. No appellant presents himself but one, a Dutchman who on the part of young Le Harnois applies for permission to carry the body of the deceased Captain Le Harnois, "descended from the Montmorencies," to a Catholic burying ground, and a dispensation from the indignity of having the hearse searched by the Excise-officers. As a magistrate, Sir Morgan flatly refuses: but on a dexterous application to his weak side as a genealogist, he grants his warrant. Bertram is persuaded to attend this funeral: on its road such tumultuous scenes of indecorum occur, that the reader begins to suspect the contents of the hearse; many of the mourners, it is clear, suspect: and finally, in spite of Sir Morgan's permit," the Excise suspect; and a party of officers stop the procession at a turnpike-gate, which they have barricadoed. Then comes forward the chief mourner, a young man of fine person and apparently in deep grief: but all fails to move the hard heart of the Excise; and at last the funeral train are obliged to storm the barriers. In one of the tempestuous scenes which follow Bertram, who stood aloof, receives a note ill-spelt but well-expressed, desiring him to meet the writer that evening at the ruins of ap Gauvon. Leaving the funeral, he sets off over a wild country to this "well-known" abbey. On his road he springs a covey of five old women, sitting under a wall, whom he takes for witches, but who in fact are dispersing smuggled claret over the country: then meets Mrs. Godber: and at length, as night falls, with much difficulty reaches ap Gau

of our æra.

von. A blazing fire in one of the vaults attracts him to the window. He overhears a conversation, in which one of the speakers is repeatedly addressed as Nicholas; his foot slips; and he is tumbling head foremost into the vault and in imminent dan ger of being shot as an intruder, when a torch reveals his features to the leader of the party, who turns out to be the writer of the little billet which had drawn him thither. This person entertains him with dinner, and claret; and then dismisses all the rest of his followers. After which comes a succession of scenes which we shall translate-as unfolding the chief characters in the novel, and preparing all that follows down to the dénouement.

Our first extract is from a conversation between Bertram and his unknown acquaintance in the vault:

"And is it your opinion that every body would pass the same keen judgment on me ?"

"Ay, if not a harsher: but do you know, Mr. Bertram, that at first sight, I knew your profession by your face, and what your destiny is in this life.

"And which of my unhappy features is it that bears this unpleasant witness against me ?"

"Unhappy you may truly call them," said the other, smiling bitterly" unhappy indeed; for they are the same as my own. I rest a little upon omens and prefigurations; and am superstitious; as all those are who have ventured upon the sea, and have risked their all upon the faith of its unsteady waves. It will mortify you (my young friend) to confess, (but it is true) that much as storm, sun, passion, and hardships, may have tanned and disfeatured my face, nevertheless it is still like thy gentle woman's face, with its fair complexion and its overshadowing locks; and when I look back upon that inanimate portrait which once an idle artist painted of me, in my 16th year, I remember that it was one and the same with thine. Kindred features should imply kindred dispositions and minds. The first time I observed you closely, on that evening when sunk in reverie, you came on shore from Jackson's brig, you meantime thinking, if indeed you thought of me at all, that I was asleep; then did I behold in your eye my own; read in your forehead all the storms that too surely have tossed and rocked the little boat of your uneasy life; saw your plans, so wide and spacious-your little peace your doubts about the end which

you were pursuing your bold resolvesbold, and with not much hope."

"Oh stranger, but thou knowest the art, far above thy education, of reading

the souls of others."

whilst he replied: "Education! oh yes, I A smile passed over his countenance too have had some education: oh! doubtless education is a fine thing, not to run in amongst gentlemen of refinement like a wild beast, and shock the gcod pious lambs with coarse manners or ferocious expressions. Oh yes, education is of astonishing value: a man of the wildest pursuits, and the nature of a ruffian, may shroud himself in this, as a wolf in sheep's clothing-and be well received by all those acinto this world, not in smoky huts, but in complished creatures whom fortune brought rich men's rooms decked with tapestry. I

too have stolen a little morsel of education amongst a troop of players; and if my coarse habits will sometimes look out, why that's no fault of mine, but of those wor thy paupers that thought proper to steal me in my infancy. There are hours, Bertram, in which I have longings, longings keen as those of women with child-longings for conversations with men of higher faculties men that I could understand-men that could answer me-aye, and that would answer me, and not turn away from the poor vagabond with disdain."

"And you have chosen me for such a comrade?"

"As you please: that rests with yourself. But, Bertram, at any rate, I rejoice to find amongst my equals one that does not as others do of the plebeian routlive the sport of the passing moment,—one that risks his life, yet in risking it knows what life is-that has eyes to seeee-thoughts to think,-feelings--but such a dissembling hypocrite as you (and here he smiled) will laugh when he hears a ruffian talk of feelings."

"Your wish is, then, to find some welleducated comrade, who, when your conscience is troublesome, may present your crimes under their happiest aspect-may take the sting out of your offences, and give to the wicked deed the colouring of a noble one?"

Nicholas knit his brows, and said with a quick and stern voice:

"What I have done I shall never deny: neither here nor there_above_if any above or below there be. I want nobody to call my deeds by pretty names, neither before they are executed nor after. What I want is a friend; one to whom I could confide my secret thoughts without kneeling as before a priest-or confessing as to a judge; one that will rush with me liko a hurricane into life, till we are both in our graves; or one that refusing to

"This I wish: will you either run joint hazard with me--and try your fortunes in this country;-or will you take your own course, but now and then permit me, when my heart is crazed by passion, by solitude, and unparticipated anguish,-to lighten it by your society?

"Once for all I declare to you with respect to your first proposal that I will enter

into no unlawful connexions."

"Be it so that word is enough. You refuse to become an adventurer like my self? I ask not for your reasons; your will in such a case is law enough. But then can you, in the other sense, be my friend ?"

"Rash man! whence is it that you derive such boundless confidence in me ?" Nicholas stepped up to the young man nearer than before-looked him keenly but kindly in the eyes-as if seeking to revive some remembrance in him; then pressed his hand, and said

"Have you forgotten then that poor wretch in the tumult of the waves, to whom, when he was in his agony, thou, Bertram, didst resign thy own security-and didst descend into the perilous and rocking waters? Deeply, oh deeply, I am in thy debt; and far more deeply I would be in thy debt, when I ask for favours such as this."

"Is it possible? Are you he? But now I recollect your forehead was then hidden by streaming hair: convulsive spasms played about your lips; and your face was disguised by a long beard."

"I am he; and but for thee should now lie in the bowels of a shark, or spitted upon some rock at the bottom of the ocean. But come, my young friend, come into the open air: for in this vault I feel the air too close and confined."

By this time we presume that the reader will have discovered for himself that the central figure in four distinct scenes-the present, the funeral of Captain Le Harnois, the mountain night-walk from the sea-shore to

M***, and the hurricane in the Bristol Channel, is one and the same person; that James Nichols, Niklas, character and exploits had furnished so Nicholas, or Nicolas, whose daring bar-room at M***. much matter for conversation in the The scene,

which follows immediately after the one we have just translated, serving still further to unfold the charac ter of Nicholas,—we give this also:-

After referring us to "Miss Ratkliff's" Romances for a description of a Gothic convent better than any novelist can paint "who has hitherto passed his days amidst the hills and vales of our Scotland less bounteously endowed with these solemn buildings--buildings of sullen exterior, such as well expresses the horrors within, just as a bad sign over a public house announces bad fare and a bad landlord;" and after deprecating any comparison of Griffith ap Gauvon with the more extensive ruins of "Bangor" the author proceeds thus:

Owls and other night birds which had found an asylum here, disturbed by the steps of the two nightly wanderers, now soared aloft to the highest turrets. At length after moving in silence for some minutes, both stepped out through the pointed arch of a narrow gate-way into the open air upon a lofty battlement. Nicholas seized Bertram's hand, with the action of one who would have checked him at some dangerous point;-and, making a gesture. which expressed-" look before you!" he led him to the outer edge of the wall. At this moment the full moon in perfect glory burst from behind a towering pile of clouds, and illuminated a region such as the young man had hitherto scarcely known by description. Dizzily he looked down upon what seemed a bottomless abyss at his feet. The Abbey-wall, on which he stood, built with colossal art, was but the crest or surmounting of a steep and monstrous wall of rock, which rose out of depths in which his eye could find no point on which to settle. On the other side of this immeasurable gulph lay in deep shadow-the main range vered with thick forests, but whose sumof Snowdon-whose base was perhaps comit and declivities displayed a dreary waste. Dazzled by the grandeur of the spectacle, Bertram would have sought re

pose for his eye by turning round; but the new scene was, if not greater, still more striking. From his lofty station he overlooked the spacious ruins of the entire monastery, as its highest points silvered over by moonlight, shot up from amidst the illimitable night of ravines, chasms, and rocky peaks that form the dependencies of Snowdon. Add to the permanent features of the scene the impressive accident of the time-midnight, with an uni versal stillness in the air, and the whole became a fairy scene, in which the dazzled eye comprehended only the total impression, without the separate details or the connexions of its different points. So much however might be inferred from the walls which lay near with respect to those which gleamed in the distance that the towers and buildings of the abbey had been for the most part built upon prominent peaks of rock. Those only which were so founded had resisted the hand of time: while the cross walls which connected them, wanting such a rocky basis, had all fallen in. Solemnly above all the chapels and turrets rose, brilliantly illuminated by the moon, the main tower. Upon a solitary crag that started from the deeps, it stood with a boldness that seemed to proclaim defiance on the part of man to nature-and victorious efforts of his hands over all her opposition. Round about it every atom of the connecting masonry had mouldered away and sunk into heaps of rubbish below-so that all possibility of reaching the tower seemed to be cut off. But beyond this tower high Gothic arches rose from the surrounding crags; and in many places were seen pillars springing from two dissevered points of rock-rising higher and higher and at last inclining towards each other in vast arches; but the central stones that should have locked the architraves of the mighty gates were wanting; and the columns stood to a fanciful eye like two lovers, whom nature and pure inclination have destined for each other, but whom some malicious mischance has separated for ever. Bertram shut his eyes, before the dazzling spectacle: when he opened them again, his guide said with a tranquil voice -in which however a tone of exultation might be distinguished,

the dread tranquillity of the spectacle; and then often I feel as though I wanted no friend; as though nature, the mighty mother, were a sufficient friend that fulfilled all my wishes-a friend far better and wiser than any which the false world can offer. But, Bertram, come a little further! He led him, sideways, from that part of the building out of which they had issued by the little portal about 100 yards further. The wall, scarce three feet wide, stood here nearly insulated: and was on the one side bounded by the abyss just described, and on the other by what might have been an inner court-that lay however at least three stories deep below. Nothing but a cross-wall, which rose above the court towards a little tower, touched this main wall. At the extremity of this last, where it broke off abruptly, both stopped. Hardly forty steps removed from them, rose the great tower, which in past times doubtless had been connected with the point at which they stood, but was now divided by as deep a gulph as that which lay to the outside wall. "Further there is nothing," said his guide: "often have I come hither and meditated whether I should not make one step onwards, and in that way release myself from all anxiety about any future steps upon this earth."

But the power and the grandeur of nature have arrested you and awed you?" "Right. Look downwards into the abyss before us:- - deep, deep below, trickles along, between pebbles and moss and rocky fragment, a little brook: now it is lit up by the moon ;-and at this moment it seems to me as if something were stirring; and now something is surely leaping over :- - but no-it was deception: often when I have stood here in meditation, and could not comprehend what checked me from taking one bold leap, a golden pillar of moonlight has met me gleaming upwards from the little brook below (brook that I have haunted in happier days); and suddenly I have risen as if ashamed-and stolen away in silence."

"Nicholas, do you believe in God?" "Will you know the truth? I have lately learnt to believe."

I lately spoke to you."

Directly after the scene proceeds thus; and as it brings out the ferocious jacobinism of Nicholas - his disordered pride, his frantic struggles with his own conscious degradation, his love, his despair, and his craziness-we give this also.

Here, Bertram, do I often stand on the giddy precipice; and I look down upon

perate men, to rid the world of a knot of vipers, for months I had waited for the moment when they should assemble together, in order to annihilate at one blow the entire brood. Daily we prayed, if you will call that praying, that this moment would arrive: but months after months passed: we waited; and we despaired. At length, on a day,-I remember it was at noon-in burst a friend upon us and cried out-Triumph and glory! this night the King's ministers all meet at Lord Har